From Tensions to Integrations: Development and Conservation Coalitions in Fijian Coastal Fisheries Management

Abstract

This thesis explores past and current dynamics of coastal fisheries management regimes in Fiji, South Pacific. In particular, it seeks to better understand the evolution of discourses and practices of advocacy coalitions of actors defending the prioritization of either economic development or biodiversity conservation objectives. Going back as far as 1890, it examines how these coalitions have proposed over time to frame, organize and control subsistence and artisanal fishing activities in Fiji, and exposes the progressive and multi-scalar encounter of ‘development’ and ‘conservation’ coalitions. Indeed, in recent years, in the face of growing calls for the sustainable and integrated management of oceans and coasts, this encounter has given a momentum to a new, collaborative, integrated management regime in which coastal fisheries hold a central place.